Have you heard the rumor that Project Management is dead? Are you deeply committed to the Agile approach? Do you believe that Project Management is an archaic process now that Agile is here? I don’t agree.

Whenever something new shows up, we’re frantic to erase the past. I believe the past informs future innovation and creativity, whether the past work is recognized as a contribution or not. Realistic Project Management can be used to manage the portfolio of things you need to get done. It can help during the Scrum to define the most important question “Why are we doing this?” I suggest re-labelling Project Management as Progress Management.

Our terminology is confused. People refer to Agile projects, whileothers call Agile a way of being. Some equate Project Management with Waterfall aka Top Down methodologies. These are different things – PM is a process that organizes work to fulfill a business need. Methodologies are ‘cheat sheets’ that help you pick the best tasks to put in your Project Plan (or in your Agile Sprint).

That said, the traditional Project Management approach is too heavy for the way work is done now, and much too heavy to cope with the constant multi-tasking which we all practice. A Realistic Project Management approach brings flexibility, agility and role clarity to projects that have well-defined outcomes and minimal stakeholders. These projects tend to be small and well-defined. ​

Let’s re-brand to avoid the historical ramifications by calling it Realistic Progress Management. Whether Agile or Top Down (or any other approaches), Bad News Early is Good News - Tell me when I can still do something about it. (send an email to Shawna.moser@moserit.com and we’ll mail you a Postcard with this saying.)